Apple is apparently trying to improve the features of its iPhone camera by acquiring a company that has, until this week, offered a way for owners of the smartphone to take full resolution photos at 20 to 30 frames per second via a 99 cent app.

TechCrunch first reported, via unnamed sources, that Apple had bought SnappyLabs which had released the popular iOS app, SnappyCam. SnappyLabs was in fact a one man development team, John Papandriopoulos, who was born in Australia but currently works in San Fransisco. Re/Code has since received a statement from Apple confirming the acquisition but, as usual, the company did not go into any details, including how much they paid for SnappyLabs.

As a consequence of Apple's buyout, the SnappyCam app is no longer available from the iTunes Store. In addition, the content of the SnappyLabs website has been taken down.

While Apple has released TV ads in the past that claimed the iPhone is the most used smartphone camera in the world, other smartphone companies have released commercials of their own that slam the iPhone's photo features. Microsoft and Nokia have taken shots at both the iPhone and Samsung's Galaxy family for their image quality when compared to those made by the 41 megapixel Lumia 1020.